


Night-Blooming Flowers

by InsanityPrelude



Category: Kingdom Hearts
Genre: Ambiguous Axel/Saïx, Body Horror, Gen, Hanahaki Disease, Marluxia Is A Dick, Mild Blood
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-01-27
Updated: 2017-01-27
Packaged: 2018-09-20 04:59:57
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,367
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9476744
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/InsanityPrelude/pseuds/InsanityPrelude
Summary: Marluxia has a creative way of getting a point across. Axel may never be able to look at moonflowers without flinching again.





	

**Author's Note:**

> My first fic in a couple years, because I looked at a new trope popping up in my fandoms and went "hey, this would be a great way for someone with plant powers to be an asshole..." ¯\\_(ツ)_/¯ Do be warned, there is body horror ahead involving coughing up/gagging on flowers if that's an issue for you.  
> edit 7/4/18: Found a partial draft while I was packing to move and edited back in a couple details that I'm not sure why I cut.

The page before Axel wasn’t getting any less blank for his staring at it. He tapped his pen against the page impatiently, trying to think. _How do I say “absolutely nothing useful has happened yet” without looking like I’ve just been sitting around?_

“You’re wasting your time, you know.”

The soft rush of air into a closing portal followed Marluxia’s voice. Both sounds seemed louder than they should be in the oversized space; neither was particularly welcome.

“Don’t remember asking for your advice,” Axel said, crumpling the blank sheet into a ball and with a flick of his wrist setting it ablaze. He watched it shrivel in upon itself as it burned, the flames licking against his palm without disturbing the leather of his glove; only when it crumbled completely to ash in a final puff of smoke did he deign to face his intruder.

“I’m merely stating the facts,” Marluxia said mildly, circling the desk to stand at its opposite side.

Axel swiveled the chair around to track him, the stare with which he fixed the other Nobody flat and unimpressed. “What do you want, Marluxia?”

“A word with a colleague in our… precarious circumstance. Nothing of substance, really,” he replied, his face offering no hint of other motives. “That--” he reached forward, sweeping the traces of fallen soot from the desktop-- “was to be a report back to Number VII, was it not?”

“Part of the job,” Axel answered flatly. Burning the paper, now that he thought about it, was a lousy move; it may have been blank, but now he looked like he had something to hide.

“And yet I wonder that you thought it necessary, given our lamentable lack of progress.”

“Just letting them know we’re not dead yet.” Axel leaned back in his chair and folded his arms behind his head. Casual. He could be talking about the weather, if there were such a thing here. “Get to the point.”

Marluxia leaned forward, his voice dropping nearly to a whisper. “That _is_ the point. You know why he sent you here—why he sent all of us to this forsaken place.”

“Enlighten me,” Axel drawled.

“You are disposable.” The threat hung in the air between them, an axe poised to fall as the two men watched each other closely.

Axel didn’t flinch. “No more than you.”

“And no less. Keep that in mind—and consider your correspondence with him carefully.”

“Sure thing, _boss,_ ” he replied, the enunciation of the last word a little too pointed.

Marluxia half turned as though to leave, and hesitated with one hand still on the desk. “By the way,” he remarked, “I recalled an interesting story from my last reconnaissance mission. The local people spoke of a most curious affliction...”

Axel arched a thin eyebrow. “Why are you changing the subject?”

“A certain flower would take root in the sufferer’s Heart and grow… choking the life out of them. It seemed it most particularly struck those bearing the burden of unrequited affection. The only hope for survival was to move on... or lose one's Heart, of course.”

His eyes looked too deeply, searching for something, and the too-knowing emphasis on his last few words set Axel’s mind racing. What did the smug bastard think he knew?

“Sounds painful,” he said casually. “Glad we don’t have to worry about that.”

“Indeed,” said Marluxia, the faintest trace of a smirk touching his lips. “I’ll take my leave, then.”

Axel gave a lazy wave farewell as he vanished into a dark corridor. A weight seemed to settle into his chest as he took out another page.

 

* * *

 

When a note arrived from Saïx, it was brief, curt, and offered no hint of its writer's thoughts. The castle itself seemed to be holding its breath for the Keybearer's arrival. Even Vexen was almost welcome when he came topside, because he brought the fruit of his research with him at last, ready for Naminé to begin her work. Ready for something to _happen._

“He’s just showing off,” Larxene complained, barely after Vexen was out of earshot. “I don’t know why we’re even still bothering with this Replica thing. Number XIV was a dud, right? An even bigger zombie than Roxas, and that’s saying something.”

“Have patience,” Marluxia chided. “Would you prefer to have him up here, nosing around where he doesn't belong? We need to see what the witch is capable of before Sora arrives.”

“Yeah, yeah, but--”

_It’s not the Replica Program she has a problem with,_ Axel thought. _It’s the fact that it was Vexen’s idea._ Vexen’s plan seemed to be working this time, and Larxene just couldn’t stand admitting he did something useful. Better keep that opinion to himself for now. He turned from the others, rubbing the front of his neck, where a dull ache was making itself at home. When he caught Marluxia watching in his peripheral vision, he returned his attention to the conversation at hand.

“He looks the part. I _guess_ he’ll make okay bait.”

"That's right," Larxene bounced a little on her heels, clasping her hands together. "Naminé should be enough, but his friend too—won't that be a surprise? What's Sora going to do when he has to fight his _oh_ so dear, best friend? I better get to watch.”

“Better him than us,” Axel said, folding his arms. The act of speaking turned the ache in his throat sharp and scratchy; he knew he sounded a little hoarse, but to his relief neither of the others seemed to notice.

“Exactly,” Marluxia agreed. Axel could swear the itching got worse when he looked at him. “I take it you will be wanting to report back about this breakthrough? I think we’re done here for now.”

He held Axel’s gaze for the space of a breath, that faint, knowing smile back on his face. Axel clenched his fist as he imagined burning it off of him.

Larxene looked from one to the other, her lips parted as though about to say something, only to shake her head and mutter to herself, _don’t even wanna know._

“I’ll leave you to it, then,” she said at last. “Ta-ta.”

She vanished into the shadows with a wink and a wave, leaving the men alone.

“As will I.” Marluxia made a peculiar gesture, curling his fingers inward toward his open palm as he called up his own corridor.

As he disappeared, a bitter, vegetal taste filled Axel's mouth and the scratching escalated from _irritating_ to _unbearable_ in an instant. He doubled over, his hacking coughs echoing in the empty hall. The fit passed as abruptly as it came on, leaving only that unsettling feeling of heaviness; he straightened, wiping his mouth, and a scrap of something white came away on his glove.

 

* * *

 

The weight of a body pinned him against a bed that was cold and hard as a sacrificial altar, a hand pressed against his chest to feel nothing beating. Blue strands brushed his face—a spike of his own hair lay plastered against his forehead—as the figure leaned down to meet him, the place where his form ended and the darkness began impossible to discern even at this close angle. The breath against his ear (a draft from the door?) raised prickles on his skin as he strained to understand the whispered words. Making a promise, or breaking one—

— _I must be waking up—_

The fingers planted against his chest dug in, distorting into bestial claws as the image of Saïx wrapped his other hand around Axel's throat.

He thrashed awake, gagging on the bitterness flooding his tongue, but the weight still held him down. The claws were within him now, tearing at his chest as something writhed and strained to free itself. Gasping for air, he fought to turn over an inch at a time. He made it onto his hands and knees just in time for the burning in his throat to reach its apex, sending him into a fit of coughing that seemed it would never end. It brought something up that was sticky and wet; when the thing in his throat allowed him a moment of respite, he spit it into his palm. He had just long enough before the next wave crashed over him to recognize the crumpled trumpet shape of a flower.

White petals, speckled with dark blood, came up with the next spasms, and torn pieces of leaf and stem stuck to his lips. As he wiped them away, the pieces fell into place: the cough, the heaviness in his chest, the petals, that infuriatingly smug smile. _"A curious affliction,"_ sure, and he was a goddamn Keybearer.

 

* * *

 

Walk. One foot in front of the other, bloodstained fingerprints where he braced himself against the wall. The corridors opened for him, and he had a feeling he knew exactly where to take them. Three steps, each one a mile long, to meet soil under his boots; a puff of white-gold pollen dusting his glove as he stopped to cough again. He honestly wasn't sure how he was remaining upright—shoulders bowed as though the weight of the intrusion in his body were pulling the rest of him toward it, but still standing because that bastard would. Not. Get. The satisfaction.

"What did you _do?"_ he choked out around a mouthful of leaves.

Marluxia rose from where he knelt, surrounded by tangling thorns, and nodded acknowledgment of the other man's arrival. "Axel. You're in quite a state."

"No sh—" A tendril forced itself up the back of his throat, setting him gagging. He bent double, grasping a branch for support as Marluxia watched impassively.

"No thanks to you," Axel finally managed. "You and your—the story—" Talking wasn't going to be an option here. He coughed up another crumpled blossom and spat it into the dirt.

Marluxia smiled. The vines parted for him as he advanced on Axel, nature itself laying out the red carpet for him in the form of a vivid pathway of blooms ahead of his feet. Axel forced himself to straighten up and let go of the tree. Flames danced at his fingertips as he raised his hand to ward him off from coming any closer. A cloyingly sweet scent of poisonous flowers Axel couldn't identify, layered with the acrid taint of the darkness, seemed to flood his senses; he didn't know how Larxene could stand it.

"There is a cure," Marluxia said softly. He reached over the warding arm, his gloved fingers brushing Axel's cheek, and chucked darkly when he flinched from the touch. "Let go. Purge him from your thoughts, as he did when he sent you here."

Axel clamped a scalding-hot hand onto the other Nobody's wrist, seeking out the edge where the glove's protection ended. He could feel the skin blister and redden under his touch, but Marluxia just tutted and shook his head as though Axel had merely disappointed him.

Something seized in Axel's chest and he staggered backward, gasping, glaring daggers at his tormentor.

"Suppose the Superior weren't lying to us all, and we did manage to reclaim our Hearts," Marluxia said, a sweeping gesture indicating the black sky outside the garden room's transparent wall. "What then, Axel? Would you be free, or would you be indebted to him—as much a pawn as Number VII? Would anything really change?"

The next attack brought Axel to his knees. " _Stop,_ " he rasped between hacking coughs. "Stop this or—I'll burn—burn the whole—I swear." He didn't think he had it in him to do that much, but he could muster enough magic for the foliage beneath his hands to begin to smoke and smolder.

Marluxia watched, only a hint of a frown showing that he was affected at all. "Join us."

"I will." Axel's voice was nearly gone.

"Excuse me?"

"I will!" A ring of flame briefly flared to life around Axel, then died, leaving the ground cover charred beneath him.

"Hold still." Marluxia bent down to take Axel by the chin, forcing his head up. His free, burned hand crooked in a beckoning motion, and the answering hard yank within Axel's chest drew from him a hiss of pain.

It would be worse within moments.

Something began to move: the plant, unwinding and climbing his windpipe, mobile as an animal. He couldn't breathe, he curled in upon himself retching and wheezing, his vision going spotty at the edges. The taste of bitter leaves and blood overwhelmed his tongue as the vine began to force itself out of his mouth. Pale, bloodstained buds burst into full bloom as they tasted the open air; the plant was long enough now for the end to coil on the ground and it was still coming. It was tearing him inside out and he knew, he absolutely knew it didn't have to be like this. It could be made to disappear if Marluxia willed it, but he was doing this on _purpose._ They called Larxene the savage one, but at least she was open about aiming to cause pain.

The end of the vine, bristling with slender rootlets, dropped to the ground but Axel remained in a pathetic heap, bracing for more. Only when he had taken a few full breaths in succession did he begin to believe it could be over. Slowly—feeling as though he'd been trampled by a Behemoth, his back and chest tight and sore and his head pounding—he rose to a crouch. A final few petals still clung to the back of his teeth, the roof of his mouth; not trusting his voice, he swept them into a ball with his tongue and spat them at Marluxia's feet instead.

Marluxia's nose wrinkled in distaste and he turned away. "Go now and rest," he said, calling up a portal with a dismissive flick of the hand. "Preparations are almost complete. You will be summoned when you are needed."

Axel could manage little more than a snarl in reply. _Lord it over while you can,_ he thought, hauling his weary body into the dark corridor. The words were bitter as the petals had been in his mouth. _Preparations are just getting started._


End file.
